What’s All the Fuss About Power Quality?

If you’re repeatedly replacing electronic control boards in your appliances, you might be a victim of dirty power. Samurai’s 17th Law of Appliance Repair states that, “Raw power is dirty power.” Power comes to us on the power lines with surges, spikes, and swells and then we crap it up further with harmonic distortion from computers and other home office equipment like copiers. The whole issue of power quality will increasingly come to the forefront of everyone’s attention as we deal with an aging power infrastructure and the additional stress placed on it by the proliferation of home office equipment. You can read an excellent primer on power quality, it’s causes, identification, and mitigation, here: A Power Quality Primer.